Good & Gather Vs Favorite Day: The Difference Between Target's In-Store Food Brands

Food shoppers love store brand products, and those are certainly in abundance at Target. With 45 private brands, Target is largely betting on them to generate profit, which is not an easy task in an extremely competitive private-brand market. In the food category, Good & Gather and Favorite Day are Target's most well-known brands. Both are marketed as budget-friendly and bring in over $30 billion annually, so it's safe to say they're very successful. Good & Gather's products are built on the premise of well-rounded nutrition, while the lineup of Favorite Day offers food items that are a bit more indulgent.

Good & Gather is Target's largest and best-performing brand. Launched in 2019, it made the store over a billion dollars in sales within the first year alone and continued to grow exponentially from there. The focus of the brand is twofold: affordability and nutrition. There are over 2000 products with the Good & Gather name, many of which are priced under $5 and all of which meet a very specific nutritional standard — no artificial sweeteners, flavors, or colorings, and no high-fructose corn syrup. Since its launch, the brand has also expanded into several special collections, such as organic, plant based, kids, seasonal, and signature.

Favorite Day was launched in 2021 with the intention of bringing sweet and sour treats to Target customers. From cookies and bakery items to fun, flavorful drinks, the brand began its journey with over 700 products, all priced under $15. Unlike with the Good & Gather, the focal point of Favorite Day is not nutrition but rather the flavor and delectability of the treats. Occasionally, this choice has received backlash from the customers — for example, we declared Favorite Day as the popular vanilla ice cream brand that you should avoid at all costs, partially because of its nutritional composition, which was a far cry from the "homemade" selling point of the ice cream.

Nonetheless, the brand still has several hits that the customers rave about, including the Pumpkin Cheesecake Ice Cream, which ranked number one in our roundup of 17 Target 2023 Fall Food Items — most of which came from the Favorite Day line to begin with. It's hard to ignore the fact, however, that more and more people are looking for snacks that taste indulgent and also come with a certain nutritional profile. Perhaps for that reason, Target is set to add snack products to the Good & Gather line in 2025 as well as more seasonal food items that were previously predominantly launched under Favorite Day.